Hedge Funds Aren’t Crazy About Walter Investment Management Corp (WAC) Anymore

In today’s marketplace, there are plenty of metrics market participants can use to watch stocks. A duo of the most innovative are hedge fund and insider trading interest. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the elite fund managers can outperform the broader indices by a significant margin (see just how much).

Just as key, bullish insider trading sentiment is a second way to analyze the financial markets. Obviously, there are plenty of reasons for a corporate insider to get rid of shares of his or her company, but just one, very clear reason why they would behave bullishly. Several academic studies have demonstrated the impressive potential of this strategy if piggybackers understand where to look (learn more here).

Keeping this in mind, it’s important to discuss the latest info about Walter Investment Management Corp (NYSE:WAC).

How are hedge funds trading Walter Investment Management Corp (NYSE:WAC)?

At the end of the second quarter, a total of 17 of the hedge funds we track were bullish in this stock, a change of -15% from one quarter earlier. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists an “upper tier” of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were increasing their stakes meaningfully.

According to our 13F database, Brian Taylor’s Pine River Capital Management had the most valuable position in Walter Investment Management Corp (NYSE:WAC), worth close to $54 million, comprising 0.8% of its total 13F portfolio. On Pine River Capital Management’s heels is SAC Capital Advisors, managed by Steven Cohen, which held a $39.5 million position; 0.2% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Other peers that are bullish include Robert Pohly’s Samlyn Capital, and Philippe Jabre’s Jabre Capital Partners.

Since Walter Investment Management Corp (NYSE:WAC) has experienced bearish sentiment from upper-tier hedge fund managers, it’s safe to say that there was a specific group of fund managers who sold off their positions entirely last quarter. It’s worth mentioning that John Murphy’s Alydar Capital dropped the biggest investment of the “upper crust” of funds we track, comprising an estimated $24.4 million in call options.. Bruce J. Richards and Louis Hanover’s fund, Marathon Asset Management, also said goodbye to its call options., about $7.1 million worth. These transactions are important to note, as aggregate hedge fund interest dropped by 3 funds last quarter.

What do corporate executives and insiders think about Walter Investment Management Corp (NYSE:WAC)?

Insider buying is best served when the primary stock in question has experienced transactions within the past half-year. Over the latest half-year time frame, Walter Investment Management Corp (NYSE:WAC) has experienced zero unique insiders buying, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

We’ll go over the relationship between both of these indicators in other stocks similar to Walter Investment Management Corp (NYSE:WAC). These stocks are Invesco Mortgage Capital Inc (NYSE:IVR), HFF, Inc. (NYSE:HF), KKR Financial Holdings LLC (NYSE:KFN), Altisource Portfolio Solutions S.A. (NASDAQ:ASPS), and Home Loan Servicing Solutions Ltd (NASDAQ:HLSS). This group of stocks are in the mortgage investment industry and their market caps match WAC’s market cap.